Rules Are Meant to Be Broken/Seven
"Yes, well, when I was an apprentice--''yes'', cats were around then, no, I'm not that old--Eustar had just become leader. He was in need of a new deputy, and there were a lot of choices. Eustar wanted someone strong, and fit, and young. Someone who would understand him. I personally thought my mentor was great for the job, but Eustar had someone else in mind... ○ Beechstep had been made a warrior just moons before Eustar's predecessor's death. Then again, the striped tom was charismatic and kind. He was helpful; he taught the kits their hunting crouches and gave them little scraps of moss or a couple of feathers to practice on. He was sweet - he lent a helping hand to whichever apprentice was tasked with cleaning the dens; he would roll the old moss into the dirtplace and not even expect a thank you. He was brave, too, in the best sense: he defended the elders in the midst of battle, even when his own life was in danger, but he knew when his enemy was beaten. Beechstep was handsome, too, which probably didn't hurt his chances. Despite all of his assets, Beechstep had never had an apprentice. He was, to put it simply, made a warrior at the wrong time and there weren't any kits. We had learned, just recently, with Moonpaw, the dangers of making a cat younger than six moons into a fighter, so we weren't about to go there. But Beechstep...something about him must have seemed right to Eustar, because the young tom was made deputy and things were well with the Clan. For a while. Beechstep never really had it in him to be mean, but I guess Eustar underestimated him. When cats said that he didn't have the capacity to say a harsh word - they meant it. This...affliction grew to the point where Beechstep's morning duties went something like this: He would emerge from the warriors' den at sunrise, a few breaths before the warriors for the dawn patrol would set out. Rather, what was supposed to be the dawn patrol. Beechstep would sit atop Eustar's meeting place and survey the Clan like some benevolent StarClan cat. The first warrior that managed to emerge from the den, Beechstep would say, "Hey--you want to go on the dawn patrol?" To this the cat would usually shake his or her head in embarrassment. Beechstep would sit back on his haunches and wait for the next cat to come out. And when they said 'no,' the process continued until all of the warriors had been exhausted and it was far past dawn and sunrise and the patrols had yet to be sent out. Then Beechstep would go onto whatever needed to be done next, with the same methods, and eventually someone would take charge and go out, but these times were few and far between. It was one particular day in the sunrises predecessing the arrival of Leafbare that the effects of this habit grew to affect the Clan in a rather unfortunate manner. "Dawn patrol?" Beechstep offered to Hiddensun, a pretty dark she-cat who had the misfortune of being one of the first to wander out into the camp. Blearily, she shook her head and sat down next to the fresh-kill pile. She appeared exhausted. "Take an extra piece of prey," the deputy called to her. "You could do with some meat on those bones. Dawn patrol?" His next inquiry was directed towards Braveheart, but the tom denied the suggestion and took a seat next to Hiddensun. Beechstep resumed his seat with his tail curled over his paws, surveying the warriors and apprentices emerging from their respective dens with hope. "Forestpaw? No? Misty--no, all right. Why don't you take the day off and visit Coldfoot, yeah? Yeah, okay, good. Icepaw, you want to go on the--? All right. Well." It was sunhigh by the time that Eustar padded from his den, yawning widely and basking in the watery sunlight that filtered through the trees as he stretched his sleep-wearly limbs. He planned on going to the fresh-kill pile, bringing a bit of prey to the cat he hoped would become his mate (and eventually would), and enjoying the day while Beechstep took care of things. But Eustar's plans were foiled early on when he traipsed to the fresh-kill pile - to find it completely empty. There were only a few floating particles of dust and some tufts of fur. Eustar bristled, his stomach beginning to rumble. "Sunpaw, Wolffur, Aqua, Swiftpaw, let's go. Hunting patrol," Eustar announced, rounding up the cats with a flick of his tail. With sullen expressions decorating every face, the aforenamed trooped to their leader's flank. "Beechstep, gather some other patrols. Most of the Clan's still here and we need prey. The other Clans will be wondering what's gone on with us if this is kept up for much longer." Eustar's patrol soon left, departing from the camp with a smattering of grumbling from the aforementioned cats; Beechstep's lack of patrols had inspired an epidemic of laziness throughout the entire camp, and this resulted in many cats growing bad-tempered when it came time for them to actually do ''something. That being said, it came as very little of a surprise when Beechstep rounded up a couple of cats and asked them, with far too much politeness than was required to achieve anything, to go on a patrol and they offered up a surfeit of excuses. "I was going to go check up on my mate," Stealthwhisker said apologetically. "He's in the medicine den and...you know..." Mosswhisker's excuse fell a few tail-lengths short of believable, but Beechstep didn't question her. In fact, he offered her a few words of advice and left her to go in the dirtplace tunnel, warning every cat that seemed to be heading that direction that Mosswhisker was about to commune with her great-aunt Mousebrain. He received a number of odd looks, but it was with satisfaction that the deputy would note that no cats seemed in any mood to enter the dirtplace tunnel while Mosswhisker's ritual was in effect. The prey heap was still as bare as it had been in the days previously, though now cats would shoot Beechstep loathsome looks as they passed it, bellies grumbling loudly. Every malice-laden glare made Beechstep wince. When Eustar and his patrol returned to camp as the sun began to dip towards the horizon, it was with grumpiness etched into every feature on their feline faces and absolute fury splitting open Swiftpaw's visage. The apprentice - who had been trained to feed elders first - had suffered without a meal for the past eight sunrises. He wasn't sure how much longer he could last. Eustar padded up to Beechstep, as close to fuming as the calm leader could get. But before he could speak, Swiftpaw sank to his belly, right in the dusty clearing of the camp, and rolled to his side. His fur was matted and his face gaunt, and his bones protruded from his pelt in a manner so undesirable it was almost a pain to look at. Eustar spun on his heel and rushed to the young apprentice's side. "Get Coldfoot," Eustar demanded, flicking his tail at Aqua. The young gray she-cat fled towards the medicine den, but Coldfoot was already emerging with leaves and a smattering of berries held in her jaws. Her own ribs were pressed flush against her patchy pelt. There was a moment when every cat's eyes were trained on the working medicine cat. Then, when she looked up with solemn eyes and shook her head, there was a splitting yowl of anguish from one end of the camp, and Swiftpaw's mother bolted out of the tunnel as fast as her hungry legs could carry her. Eustar rounded on Beechstep, who had pressed himself as close to the edge of camp as possible as if blending into the bushes would help deflect the stares of his furious Clanmates. "You tried, Beechstep," Eustar mewed. "You tried, but you didn't try hard enough. One cat is dead because you couldn't manage to send a couple of cats out on patrol. One cat is dead because you couldn't see through the StarClan-forsaken excuses your Clanmates were feeding you. One cat is dead ''because of you. I don't want to see your face in this camp again." And so it was. ○ "Yes, Beechstep was banished, little one. Tanglekit, please settle down--Ashkit, no, that is not a leaf, that's something called my tail. Kits! Anyways, Redpoppy? You want to take this one? See if you can manage this lot."